Every company runs on processes. They set the standard for how work gets done and make the result predictable.
But when a process runs on manual data entry and approvals nobody can track, the work slows down and no one can say where it stopped.
Business process automation is how finance and operations teams fix that.
This guide covers what business process automation is, what it changes, what it looks like in practice, and how to get started.
Business process automation is the use of software to run multi-step business workflows with little or no manual intervention. It handles the repeatable work inside a process, like capturing data, routing documents, applying rules, requesting approvals, and recording what happened.
Start with the underlying term.
A business process is a set of tasks or activities that you carry out to achieve a specific outcome. It lets you standardize how your team works and ensures more consistent results.
Companies of every size benefit from clearly defined processes. Clear processes set expectations and make it obvious who owns what, so employees know which tasks are theirs and when they’re due.
Processing invoices is an example of a business process. Here are the steps involved from start to finish:
Each step of the invoice approval process is clearly defined.
However, manual data entry and document routing slow approvals down. Invoices sit in inboxes, payments go out late, and early payment discounts expire before anyone sees them.
Ardent Partners' State of ePayables 2025 found that automating the process cuts invoice processing costs by 60% to 80% compared with manual and paper-based methods.
Let’s revisit the invoice approval process above.
Instead of keying invoice data into your accounting system and routing documents for approval by email, accounting automation software reads the invoice, matches it against the PO, applies the GL coding, and routes it to the right approver.
This is just one example. Your company likely relies on dozens or even hundreds of processes to get work done.
With workflow automation software, the same pattern applies to the rest of them, with fewer handoffs, fewer places for work to stall, and a record of every step.
Manual processes hold up fine at low volume. They stop holding up when you add a location, an entity, or a few hundred more invoices a month. Work that used to take a day starts taking a week, and the only fix on offer is more headcount.
Here’s how business process automation can benefit your company:
Whether you’re onboarding a new hire, processing an invoice, or handling a customer refund, you generally follow the same steps. However, problems can occur if these steps aren’t standardized (one location coding the same expense to a different GL account than another).
Automating a process forces clarity first. You can't automate what you can't describe, so the exercise of mapping a process usually surfaces the undocumented workarounds people have been running for years. What you get on the other side is one version of the process instead of five.
In a 2025 survey of more than 900 finance and accounting leaders, every respondent said manual data problems were holding their team back from higher-value work. For 42%, it was a constant drain.
Time spent on mundane tasks means less time on more productive tasks like reviewing spend, resolving exceptions, and closing the month on schedule.
Business process automation helps you reduce and even eliminate mundane tasks. Instead of keying data from one system into another, employees can focus on judgment work. It’s better for morale too, since nobody got into finance to retype numbers from a PDF.
Those hours are also the clearest path to a positive ROI, because they show up on the payroll you already run rather than in a line item you have to defend.
Manual processes are prone to errors. It only takes a transposed digit in an invoice total or a spreadsheet formula that quietly stopped covering the last row. Once someone catches it, the document goes back for correction and the approval chain starts over from the top.
Automation removes the keystroke. Capture recognition technology reads header and line-item data off an invoice, then validates it against rules you set, so the values that reach your accounting system have already been checked. Capture rates get the attention, but the exceptions are where the real difference shows up. A capture layer that flags a mismatch and routes it to a person who can resolve it keeps bad data out of the GL. One that guesses does not.
When every step happens by hand, nobody can see the process. A manager asking where an approval stands has to ask the person who has it, assuming they know who that is. Status lives in inboxes and in people's heads.
Workflow automation software provides real-time visibility into your processes, allowing you to monitor progress across each step. That helps you quickly identify bottlenecks and inefficiencies that are holding a process back.
Most finance teams already know what their auditors will ask for. The difficulty is producing it. When approvals happen over email and supporting documents live in a shared drive, assembling a sample takes days of reconstruction.
Automated processes keep audit trails as a byproduct of running. Every step carries a timestamp, an actor, and the document version in play, so the record exists before anyone asks for it.
These records can also strengthen the controls around processes like invoice approvals. For example, you can view the audit trail to confirm the proper actions were taken before an invoice was approved.
Not every process should be automated.
For example, following up with a vendor requires a more human touch. While you can automate the reminder, you probably don’t want to automate the whole thing.
Good candidates for automation usually check a few of these boxes.
Let’s look at some examples in the next section.
If you’re not already leveraging automation, you’re missing out on opportunities to streamline your operations. Here are just a few business processes that are ripe for automation.
Invoice processing is an important part of accounts payable. It involves tracking what you owe to vendors and ensuring that any outstanding balances are paid in a timely manner.
However, manually entering data from invoices into your accounting system and checking them against purchase orders can slow down approvals. This can affect your ability to capture early payment discounts.
With accounting automation software, you can streamline your entire procure-to-pay process and reduce turnaround times.
A strong onboarding process is key to helping new hires acclimate to their roles. However, this process is often filled with tasks like filling out employment and tax documents.
With an automated employee onboarding workflow, you can streamline the paperwork and provide a more engaging onboarding experience. HR can spend more time helping new hires prepare for their roles instead of burying them with paperwork.
The hiring process typically starts with a job requisition. Department managers submit it to fill an open position. However, manually filling out these forms and routing them to HR for review can slow down the hiring process.
With a human resources automation workflow, you can replace paper-based forms. Once approved, you can have the opening posted to your website and start collecting applications.
Paper time-off requests are tedious for everyone involved, and they make it harder for employees to get time approved and for managers to plan coverage.
With workflow automation software, you can create a time-off request workflow. Instead of filling out paper forms, employees can submit a time-off request with an online form and have it routed automatically to their manager for review. The employee’s records are updated once the request is approved.
These are seven of the most common starting points. The next section covers how to pick one and run the project.
Any time you need to change or amend the scope of a project, you’ll need to submit a change request. However, managing these documents without the right process can be challenging.
To easily manage change orders, you can build and deploy electronic web forms. You can then connect these forms to your databases and even integrate them into an automated workflow.
Contracts outline expectations and provide legal protections for both parties. However, drafting new contracts and getting the necessary approvals can be a lengthy process.
Automation software eliminates the hassles of preparing contracts by hand. Features like revision control enable you to see the entire history of a contract. What’s more, you can enforce business rules for greater oversight.
A purchase order request is an internal document that employees create and submit to the purchasing department. It breaks down needed goods or services that a team or individual wants to buy.
Automating this process eliminates the majority of the paperwork. You can also set up instant routing to ensure that purchase order requests don’t get lost or misplaced.
And these are just a few examples of processes that you can automate in your business. Now let’s take a look at how you can get started with BPA.
The projects that work start narrow and prove out before they expand. These six steps are the sequence most finance teams follow.
Automation projects stall for organizational reasons more often than technical ones. Get the people who own the process on board before you evaluate software, not after.
Identify one or two processes that take up a lot of valuable time and resources. Then break down how automation will help change them. Think fewer touches per transaction, approvals you can track without chasing anyone down, and a month-end close that doesn’t hinge on a weekend of catch-up.
Building a compelling case for automation will help increase buy-in. If you can demonstrate a positive ROI, you’re more likely to get support from key stakeholders.
Before you can automate your process, you need to have a clear understanding of each. Look at each of your processes. What are the tasks involved? Who is responsible for them? How long does each step actually take, and where does work sit waiting?
Auditing your existing processes will help you uncover any inefficiencies and identify tasks that you can automate. Consider seeking input from those involved to get their feedback. Note down any challenges or bottlenecks that they frequently encounter.
The people doing the work know where it breaks. They also know the workarounds they built to keep it moving, and those workarounds are usually the first thing an audit needs to surface.
Before you start looking for software, first identify any requirements it must meet. This will help you find the right fit.
Say your main goal is cutting manual data entry. Capture recognition technology belongs at the top of your requirements list, and it’s worth asking how the software handles documents it can’t read cleanly, since that’s where the time goes.
Most platforms will demo well. The differences show up in three places.
Consider assigning an automation project manager to help with this step. Their responsibilities will include evaluating individual vendors and scheduling product demos. They will also serve as a point of contact for internal stakeholders.
The common mistake is automating everything at once. Too much change at once means nobody trusts any of it.
Start with just one or two processes that you can automate. Choose a process that follows a set of defined steps and gets repeated often. It should also deliver a financial benefit when it’s automated.
For example, when your accounts payable team spends a lot of time processing invoices, automating this process can help lower processing costs and reduce turnaround times. It's also the process most likely to produce a number you can take to the next budget conversation.
As you start automating your processes, don’t forget to document and communicate those changes. Consider rolling out changes in phases to avoid overwhelming your team.
Take your baselines before you automate anything. You can't demonstrate an improvement you never measured.
For an invoice workflow, the numbers worth tracking are cost per invoice, cycle time from receipt to approval, the share of invoices that clear without a human touching them, exception rate, and early payment discounts captured against discounts available.
Let’s say that one of your goals is to process invoices faster. Once the data shows a positive impact on turnaround times, you know you’re on the right track. Continue to monitor your process and look for areas of improvement.
Then pick the next process. The second one is easier, because the case has already been made.
The first process is the one that matters. Pick something that repeats often, follows defined steps, and produces a number you can measure, then get it live before you scope the second one.
onPhase automates the processes that move money and documents through finance and operations: invoice capture and matching, payment approvals, purchase requests, and the records behind all three. It connects to NetSuite, Sage Intacct, SAP, Microsoft Dynamics, Business Central, and Acumatica, and it is SOC 1, SOC 2, HIPAA, PCI, and NACHA compliant.
See how this works with your ERP.
Workflow automation handles a single sequence of tasks. It routes an item to the right person, applies approval rules, and moves it to the next step. Business process automation is broader. It covers an end-to-end process from start to finish, which usually means one or more workflows plus data capture, integration with the systems of record, and the audit trail behind all of it. In practice, workflow automation is a component of business process automation rather than an alternative to it.
Robotic process automation uses software bots to mimic human actions in an existing interface. A bot logs in, clicks through screens, and copies values between fields, which means it sits on top of the process without changing it. Business process automation changes the process itself, connecting systems at the data level rather than the screen level. RPA is often used to bridge a system that offers no other integration path. It also tends to break when an interface changes, which is why it's usually a workaround rather than a destination.
It depends on the scope, and the honest way to scope it is one process at a time rather than the whole platform. A single well-defined workflow with a clean integration path goes live faster than a multi-process rollout across several entities. Ask any vendor for the timeline on a first workflow specifically, not on the platform, and ask what portion of that timeline depends on your team rather than theirs.
Less than most finance teams expect, though not none. Building and changing workflows is configuration work that finance and operations teams handle themselves in a no-code platform, so IT is not in the path every time an approval threshold changes. IT involvement concentrates at the start, around the integration to the ERP, authentication, and access controls. A phased rollout keeps that involvement to one integration at a time.
No. Automation sits in front of the ERP rather than replacing it. Documents and transactions are captured, coded, and approved in the automation layer, then written to the ERP as clean records. That's why the integration question matters more than the feature list. The point is to keep your system of record and stop typing into it by hand.
It usually means the same team handles more volume rather than a smaller team handling the same volume, which is what scaling without adding headcount actually looks like in practice. The work that disappears is the keying, printing, and chasing. The work that remains is the part that needs judgment, like resolving exceptions, managing vendor relationships, and reviewing spend. Teams that automate AP generally end up with the same people doing more valuable work, not fewer people doing the same work.